Chères oubliées

Hilda Twongyeirwe est une poétesse, écrivaine et éditrice ougandaise.

Voici deux de ses poèmes, « Greet Africa when you return » et  « Circle of women »

Greet Africa when you return

I greet you Africa
I greet you from Cape to Cairo
I hug you with arms of my sister from Somalia
She implored me:
Greet Africa when you return.

At Southern Theatre we met
On a gray Scandinavian evening
But the African sun still shone in her eyes
The effusive Nile flowed into our handshake
Connecting us in an embrace
Of what we share
Of what we are.

But I felt a fear tear into her voice
It wrapped her tongue when she spoke
This place my sister
Sucks something out of you
So you are not you
You are you
But you are not you
Just greet Africa when you return.

I greet you Africa
I greet you with her sacrifice of tears
I dare cleanse you of bloodstains that have denied her home
She implored me:
Tell Africa
Her children abroad are roadside stones.

Circle of women

Your head is a hive
you are not sure you will survive.
Women form a circle around you
In their eyes, your stories flow like The Nile.
They collect them
and hand you the cup.

 Go ahead
they say
but you hesitate.
   It’s okay
they say
and you receive.

You raise the cup to your lips
and pass the cup to the next woman
you all sip in turns.

It’s an oath not to upset social strings in veneration.

You pass the string tighter to next generation
of women you know
of women you do not know
until you realise it’s a scheme
and the string
eats deep into skin.

You drop it
And break the circle.